The Chambers@916 gallery in downtown Portland is currently hosting "Connecting …," a group show that explores "the many facets of connection." Korea-born artists Sang-ah Choi and Jiseon Lee Isbara were among nine creatives invited by curator and director Martha Morgan to take over the space with their interpretation of the theme.

Sang-ah Choi often chooses to hide the confused and discomforting messages in her work behind a thick layer of glitter and gooey shellac. "Mediated-scape" — the two-panel mixed-media piece she presents for "Connecting …" — is no different.

The two panels represent Choi’s personal process of connecting world events and her personal life: the cycle of continuously monitoring and processing current events and then situating those observations back into the day-to-day landscape.

In the left panel, Choi depicts 25 days worth of news imagery in painting, including mugshots and burning cars. In the foreground of the image, Choi connects the external images to her personal landscape with a superimposed, painted depiction of the cup she used to mix the paint that went into creating that day’s image. "This is how I connect my life with the outside world," Choi explains. Almost as an afterthought, she sprinkles the painting with idyllic, traditional Korean landscapes around the edges of her personal log of the outside world.

In the right panel, bright green, hilly landscapes dominate the image. The painted news footage is confined to smaller nooks and crevices of the manically cheerful scene. Unlike the other panel, where the chaos of the news is checked by the consistency and familiarity of the paint cup, the startling news images roam freely in the second landscape.

Choi notes that the process of connecting with the world can be both difficult and uncomfortable. Through the use of pastel colors and glitter, she aims to disarm the viewer to induce deeper levels of engagement with the piece.

"It’s kind of scary!" Choi remarks, "Glitter can make everything pretty. It can make this dystopian landscape look inviting."

Jiseon Lee Isbara’s installation, "Ties," bears a more pleasant message. The long, knotted strings of draped fabric displayed in the corner of the gallery were originally displayed as part of the "Installation Art Exhibition" at the 15th Suwon Hwasung Fortress Theatre Festival in Suwon, South Korea. "I wanted to create a work that would celebrate the beauty of Korea," Isbara explains.

For this installation, however, "Ties" is more a meditation on the act of physically connecting one strand of cloth to another. To Isbara, knotting and fastening are deeply meaningful acts, and have been for centuries in many cultures. Whether tied with haste or meticulous care, the creation of a knot is ripe with significance.

Isbara adds, "In Japan, there are wish trees where people will write the things they wish for onto paper and tie it onto a tree. In Korea, villagers would put colorful fabric over trees to prevent misfortune from entering the town. It means a lot personally for me to understand that kind of action."

"Connecting …" is on display through October 22 at Chambers@916, located at 916 N.W. Flanders Street in Portland. To learn more, call (503) 227-9398 or visit <www.chambersgallery.com>.